Changemakers, purple cows, outsiders or entrepreneurs; it doesn’t matter how you label them, they’re changing the world and succeeding despite it.
One of our favorite books is Purple Cow by Seth Godin. The book can be summarized in two words: Be Remarkable. The only way to stand out amidst all the noise is to be innovative. If you’re rolling your eyes like “duh we know that,” just give us a minute to get to our point. Innovative is such a damn buzzword, which is why Godin refers to it as “finding your purple cow.” How will you stand out? How will you be different? This isn’t product specific, it is simply excelling or doing something your competitors are not doing or not doing well.
Take 8THIRTYFOUR for example, 15 years ago when Kim founded the agency, she threw out hourly billing, the industry standard for all agencies, and changed the focus to be on deliverables and relationships. It is our Purple Cow. Interestingly enough, 15 years later, we are still in the minority and crushing it by the way. Being different often means being better.
What makes an outsider or a purple cow?
- Perseverance. Pursuing remarkable is often met with roadblocks, naysayers and critics. Status quo doesn’t want you to make waves or disrupt what is comfortable and familiar. Outsiders need to work ten times as hard to ensure their ideas are heard all while proving their worth.
- Selling. Extraordinary outsiders’ primary problem is not their ideas but selling those ideas, precisely because of their disruptive implications. As the late Clayton Christensen noted in his 1997 book The Innovator’s Dilemma, “disruptive technology should be framed as a marketing challenge, not a technological one.”
- Insight. Entrepreneurs see things differently and embrace the chaos along the path to discovery. They find comfort in the uncomfortable and constantly push themselves to do better, be better. When someone says it is impossible, they map out all the ways it is possible. To them a “no” is often a “yes.”
As our best friend Seth Godin would say, “you’re either remarkable or you’re invisible.”
We pride ourselves on doing things differently and embracing the uncomfortable, because in the discomfort you find growth.
Want to learn more about our approach? Set up a time to meet with Kim; she loves talking about it.
